Ares: 98th Hunger Games
by KvasirCobra
Summary: President Snow was able to regain control during the 75th Games and the events continued. Although the world has changed and the excitement builds for the Games' centenary in two years time, twenty-three children will still die. Who that will be, only fate can decide but victory never comes to the deserving. SYOT/SYOC OPEN.


**This is the first chapter for my SYOT, Ares: 98th Hunger Games. I am taking submissions for twelve males and twelve females to start this story. The scene below takes place during the 96th Hunger Games. Enjoy and I hope you submit. The form and Tribute list is on my profile.**

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"We shouldn't be lighting a fire," I said, my fur covered knees pressed tightly against my red cheeks. Brysen, who sat across the fire, took his gaze away from the dark woodland that enveloped us and turned to me. With a smirk, he raised his arms, a machete grasped tightly in his right hand. He looked around at the freshly fallen snow around us a let out a quick, exhale of air.

"And how would we stop ourselves from freezing to death?" Brysen asked, looking back at me. I did not reply, far too cold to become tangled within Brysen's petty arguments. Instead, I attempted to pull myself into a tighter ball against the icy breeze.

"The kid was just reminding us that we are not the only ones out there," Marianna sighed, poking the fire with a rusted, blunt sword. A weapon that was useless in combat, even if she knew how to use it, but it was something that made Tributes think twice before attacking her. "There are still three others-"

"And that is why I am on guard," Brysen said bluntly. "I watch your back, you watch mine." The blonde haired girl gave a nod.

"And the sides?" I said through a voice crack. Brysen sighed, ignoring my question and returning to his watch.

"It's hard to stay silent in this snow, out there, parts will be waist deep, we should be alerted to them before they get close." I offered the girl a warm smile feeling thankful for her kindness when Brysen had been nothing but cold.

At the very cusp of the Games, an alliance seems like the best tactic. Unless you are naive, it's not easy to trust people you had known for less than a week yet the idea they will act as an extra defense when you are, for lack of a better word, weak was too tempting. However, when the battles are finished and you are left with nothing but the silent night around you and the fear of death with every breath, the cracks start to show.

Brysen and Marianna were both eighteen, three years older than myself. At first, the gap seemed small, Brysen matched me in height, even if Marianna towered at least five inches above us. However, the maturity they approached situations with was something I could not match. They reminded me of this fact every day since the bloodbath through their patronizing words and distrust in my abilities. I felt like a child when I sat with them, even though they were far from adulthood themselves.

The alliance had become strained over the past two weeks as food became scarce and the nights become longer. Conversations served to keep us from going insane and the only reason we had not fractured was no one wanted to risk their safety or the bloodshed that would ensue.

So we sat around a fire, every night in silence. The location changed but the world around us was very much the same. The tall, trees adorned in pine needles and the never ending snow that seemed to stretch for as far as the fire's light would reach. Now and again the silence would be broken by a branch giving way from the weight of the snow. It was a sound that shattered the air like ice and placed the three of us on edge for at least an hour. No one making a sound.

Yet when it happened this time, Marianna seemed to become far more startled by the noise than usual. Her eyes, blue like frost looked into the night, wide with fear, her breath becoming shallow. Brysen just sighed, laying his machete over his knees.

"I swear they do it on purpose to keep us awake," he hissed, rubbing his eyes with his thick, winter gloves. Marianna looked back at the fire, pulling her sword from flames, the tip burning a deep orange.

"The fire is dying, we need more wood otherwise we will freeze by sunrise," she spoke, her voice void of emotions or the fear I had witnessed a few moments ago.

Brysen looked to the fire and raised a brow, the flames showing no signs of dying.

"I think a storm is coming anyway, it will be best to stock up...just in case," I lied before Brysen could question her motives. Marianna had made similar excuses before when she wanted some privacy for a moment. Brysen wasn't the most honorable of people so if he knew, he would insist on keeping guard, taking liberties with his gaze.

Once Brysen realized he was outnumbered, he gave a nod, looking back into the night.

"Alright...but take a torch so we can see where you are," the dark-haired boy grunted, much to the relief of Marianna. The girl then turned to me, a serious tone to her voice.

"My sword is blunt, Fennel, you're dagger isn't...will you keep guard?" I was never popular back home with my looks so I knew nothing flirtatious was about to occur and her voice, the slight quiver, and break, frightened me like she was begging for me to go with her. Before I could answer, Brysen spoke for me.

"The fire puts a target on our back as it is, we need two people at camp...swap weapons with him if it calms your nerves...you won't be going far anyway."

Marianna seemed to deflate as, with a nod, she passed the sword to me, taking the small, three-inch dagger in return. Without a second thought, she said her goodbyes and vanished into the night, leaving me alone with Brysen.

For a boy who treated me like a useless child, he never refrained from a vulgar conversation lacking any form of intelligence. Not because he lacked brains, a good looking boy, he wasn't the meathead stereotype, he must have just lacked social skills or maybe he assumed girls was the closest we would get to mutual interests. Whatever it was, he never changed his topic, Marianna.

I could understand, she was a pretty girl and the only girl both of us had talked to in three weeks who did not want to kill us in our sleep. Even lacking in appearance, anyone would have become attractive under those terms. What I did not understand was Brysen's need to express his plans and desires to me. Maybe if I had shown how uncomfortable his thoughts made me when he talked about how he thought she might like him three weeks ago, I could have escaped it. We could have talked about something worthwhile, like our homes.

"But it's too cold to do it here...she didn't trust me enough before all of this...I kinda wish she had asked me to be a guard so I could have at least seen-"

"I'm sure she didn't mean anything like that-"

"Of course she didn't, she only asked you because she knows we need someone strong to hold the camp while she was gone." His lie did little to convince me. It angered me somewhat that he placed Marianna in danger because that was better than someone else possibly living out his fantasy.

"Can you see her light?" I asked, trying to change the conversation. Brysen woke up from his daydream and looked into the night, he eyebrows knotting.

"No, she must have turned it off." it was a normal thing, so much so that Brysen didn't seem too bothered as he looked in the direction she went. Yet, something did not feel right, it was almost like the Arena had become darker and colder in the minutes we had been talking.

"We should go check-"

"Why?" Brysen spat, pointing his machete at me. "You two got something planned?"

"No-she could be in trouble-"

"If she was, we would have heard something, screams, something...she's probably just saving battery power...there wasn't much left-" Brysen's words trailed off towards the end as his brown eyes focused on flames before him that grew smaller by the second until they were nothing but smoke, blown away by a sub-zero gust.

"What did you do?"

"Nothing!" Brysen snapped, jumping up to his feet, circling around the fire, machete in hand. The world around us had now become dark, only the outline of the nearby trees and Brysen visible. Brysen's frantic circling only detectable by his footsteps in the snow.

"We should go and find Marianna," I whimpered, looking at the tree line for any sign of her torchlight.

"We can't see a thing," Brysen growled. "There are too many traps in the woods, we are better off holding our own here, at least...whatever it is has to come into the open-" a sound cut my ally off, moving through the forest like a breeze through the trees, a howl that somewhat mimicked the sound of shattering glass, nothing like any animal I had heard before.

"What was-" I was cut off when the deep shriek of a boy enveloped the ghostly howl, only a few feet away from us, a cannon in quick succession. As the howl died, the world became silent once more only this time, the silence was otherworldly.

Brysen finally took a sharp intake of air as he looked into the darkness like he had seen his own end.

"It's the finale-" with a shattering shriek, the darkness seemed to come alive, lurching from the treeline, snapping the large trees like twigs. Shimmering in the moonlight, an object the size of a grown man's skull with the look of still water swung at Brysen.

The boy had no time to react, taking a strike to the head that sending him five feet across the clearing into the fresh snow.

I watched as my ally's body became still, watching his attacker come into the light. The creature snarled as it turned to me, bearing it's clear, sharp teeth as it's eyeless sockets saw me through the cover of darkness. It was a wolf, I knew that much. I had seen one that once broke through the fence back at Nine. But this beast was nothing of the sort. It was as large as brown bear upright with a lifeless aura and a body seemingly made of ice, invisible within the darkness.

I stumbled back into the snow, my eyes trained on the frozen, clear face of the creature, my body unable to stand. I kicked snow, hoping within desperation that it might confuse the eyeless creature. However, as if almost amused, the beast growled, allowing me enough space to fight back but not enough to get away.

When my back was against the tree line, the wolf seemed to tire of the game and let out a throaty growl as it pulled me towards him with his paw. Then it froze, letting out a whimper of pain shaking its body violently.

I watched in horror, unable to move as Brysen backed away, holding the handle of his machete, shards of the blade lodged within his hands. Blood covered his gaunt features and matted his hair while the back of his skull had become caved in from the impact, his skull shattered.

He dropped the handle and looked at his blood-soaked hands, unsteady on his feet as the beast turned his attention from me, towards Brysen. The only injury, for all the pain Brysen, had caused himself, being a chipped back and a deep crack that ran through the creature's see-through body.

Brysen looked at me with empty eyes and I hoped he was seeing something else. His brain was barely keeping him upright, I just hoped it was dead enough not to register what was to come.

The wolf pushed Brysen to the ground gently, confused by his reaction, or lack of, to his impending doom. Once he was on the ground, I found myself unable to look away as it placed its paw on the boy's chest and started to push down. It seemed to growl in delight when Brysen let out a small shriek, his hands clawing at the creatures leg. As it added more power, I could hear Brysen's ribs shattering like ice under the weight as blood pooled within his mouth, pouring down his chin. Then he started to shake, his body convulsing, I wasn't even sure if it was his skull injury or he was drowning in his own blood but after less than a minute, his head lifted, for a split second before his cannon sounded.

I let out a small whimper as his face flashed in the sky, the small side smirk I had come to hate, looking back down at me. I had wished him dead on multiple occasion yet, in his final moments, he had chosen to defend me. Even if it was because he knew he was dying anyway, he tried to save me, something I knew I would not have done for him.

Then I hated myself. Because it was for nothing. With a shiver, the wolf jingled like glass and turned to me, snarling. I tried not to cry as I realized Brysen's sacrifice was to buy me time, not to kill the wolf yet I had stayed, frozen in fear to the spot. I looked over to Brysen's broken body and started to weep, overwhelmed by thousands of emotions. I wanted to be brave, to slay the beast, to protect someone far more deserving of life than myself but I wasn't. At the end of it all, after three weeks in denial, trying to prove how mature I was, I really was just a frightened child.

And, like a child, in my final moments, I screamed in fear as I felt the wolf's breath against my skin, as cold as the ice it was made from.


End file.
